LG Chem Expands Environmental Safety 'Global Standard' Worldwide

[Asia Economy Reporter Hwang Yoon-joo] LG Chem is establishing its own 'global standard' for environmental safety and expanding it to its worldwide business sites.

On the 7th, LG Chem announced that it will redefine environmental safety standards for all its global business sites and significantly strengthen its management system.

This is a strong follow-up measure to the 'Environmental Safety Enhancement Plan' announced last May. Currently, LG Chem is actively operating the 'M-Project,' composed of in-house environmental safety and process technology experts as well as external professional organizations, aiming to achieve zero major environmental safety accidents by 2021.

LG Chem plans to strengthen its unique environmental safety 'global standard' applied to all worldwide business sites to the highest global level and manage it beyond mere compliance with local regulations.

First, LG Chem completed an urgent diagnosis of high-risk processes and facilities at 37 global business sites (15 domestic, 22 overseas) and identified a total of 590 improvement items.

To promptly address the identified improvements, LG Chem is additionally investing a total of 81 billion KRW in environmental safety this year alone. The detailed diagnosis currently underway with external experts is planned to be completed for all 37 global sites within this year.

Vice Chairman Shin Hak-cheol personally prioritizes the M-Project, directly visiting domestic sites and leading video conferences for overseas sites to oversee the urgent diagnosis of all domestic and international business sites.

Through the M-Project, LG Chem plans to complete key tasks such as ▲redefining the environmental safety regulation system ▲operating the Mother Factory ▲establishing accident detection and prevention systems by 2021. Based on the urgent safety diagnosis conducted over a month at 37 global sites and the detailed safety diagnosis to be completed within the year, LG Chem plans to redefine the company-wide environmental safety regulation system by the end of next year.

Currently, LG Chem is supplementing and revising the existing regulatory system and technical guidelines. In collaboration with external professional firms, a total of 25 revisions in environmental safety areas such as design, operation know-how, maintenance, and regulations will be reflected this year.

LG Chem is also focusing on developing technology that can predict accident signs in advance by utilizing Big Data. Pilot facilities for this DX (Digital Transformation) technology have been established at the Yeosu and Daesan petrochemical plants, and next year, the technology will be expanded to applicable business sites and unit plants.

In the second half of this year, LG Chem will change the management of environmental safety budgets and investments from each business division to the corporate environmental safety organization. The company plans to improve the organizational system for environmental safety at the corporate level to further strengthen accident prevention.

This year, LG Chem is investing a total of 235 billion KRW solely in environmental safety. It is focusing especially on securing necessary professional personnel and reorganizing domestic and overseas environmental safety-related organizations to ensure that the management policy of prioritizing environmental safety in all business activities is firmly practiced throughout the organization.

Vice Chairman Shin Hak-cheol of LG Chem said, "We deeply feel the heavy responsibility for recent accidents and have been devising fundamental measures with the determination that there is no future if environmental safety is not corrected." He added, "Based on the spirit of not operating if it is not safe, we will devote all efforts to instilling the high-intensity environmental safety policies we have prepared at all global business sites."

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.